Landon Powell Clears Waivers

Athletics catcher Landon Powell has cleared waivers, reports Susan Slusser of The San Francisco Chronicle (allTwitterlinks). She notes that Powell can refuse the outright assignment to the minors, but he's unlikely to do so because he'd forfeit his $620K contract for 2012. That contract is not guaranteed, however. Jane Lee of MLB.com says (on Twitter) he has eight days to make the decision.

Powell, 29, was designated for assignment following the Gio Gonzaleztrade late last month as Oakland needed to clear 40-man roster space. He told Slusser back then that he hoped to get picked up by another club or traded. Powell is a .207/.284/.328 career hitter in 406 big league plate appearances, and he's thrown out 29 of 73 attempted basestealers during his career, a stellar 39.7%.

The Orioles should take a flyer on him. If he doesn’t make the team, he is better than anything they have in the minors. He could work with the few, the proud, the cavalry pitchers who can’t get themselves together to compete in the AL East. He’d be great for the development of our AAA guys!

Well he passed through waivers so obviously no one thought he was worth 620k. Sounds like a no brainer on his part to elect to stay with oakland bc he will not find that anywhere else. Even though he’ll be in AAA.